Jesus said, “Rise! Let us go! Here comes my betrayer!” At that moment, Judas Iscariot appeared from the darkness. He approached Jesus and said “Rabbi!” in a friendly manner. Then he kissed Jesus on the cheek. Horribly enough, Judas used an act that people use in a trusting, loving or even sympathetic relationship and he used it as a signal to sell the Lord. Once the violent crowd received the signal and made a loud entrance, the quiet of the night was broken. Temple guards and hundreds of Roman soldiers came out of the darkness. They were fully armed, as if trying to catch a band of thieves.
Judas was entrusted with guiding them. His activities were so skilled and enthusiastic that no one would believe he was one of the twelve, feasting with the Lord a few hours before. But his shocking corruption did not happen in just a few hours. Within his heart, he had been heading toward a world of corruption for a long time. If this was not so, we would never have seen this behavior. Unlike what he first expected, Judas realized Jesus had no plans to build His kingdom on earth, so not only was he disappointed that he would gain no realistic benefits from following Jesus, but he became very angry.
He followed Jesus until then because he believed that he would gain wealth and power alongside Jesus when He set up His kingdom on earth. Judas Iscariot tried to take advantage of the love of God because of his love for himself. Unfortunately, this falsehood can be found even among so-called ‘believers’ today. They claim to devote themselves to the Lord, but their hearts have already departed from Him. The moment they decide that their lives in the church no longer provide them with benefits but losses instead, they start thinking about the best way to forsake the Lord’s will.
If we do not want to become like these false believers in God’s sight, we must train ourselves for a new life as soon as we possess faith. The Lord saved us from sins. If His merit is not to be in vain, we must detest sin and be on guard against it. Some people get swayed by this simple logic, “Even our future sins are completely forgiven from the moment we possess faith”, so they feel easy and then commit sins. Other people say, “If we accepted the Holy Spirit, we do not have to dwell on sins any more”, and they slacken their precaution against sin. But the Holy Spirit did not come to us so that we could ignore sin, but to gain the power to fight and overcome sin.
God does not just want to save us, but He wants to use us for His work. However, we always turn away from God’s will and want to carry out human desires. For sure, there is probably no believer who speaks badly about God to His face. But we sometimes desert God when it concerns the work He is doing. If we continue this behavior, we will become too adept in doing things however we want, and we will lose our hearts to the devil without realizing. Let’s acknowledge that we cannot do anything in our own strength and accept God’s guidance.
(Lord’s Day Service on February 13, 2022)
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